Issue 20
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Table of Contents:
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1. A short email from one of our subscribers
(Editor: If you have something you would like to share with us, please feel free to do so.)
My name is Michael Amos. I have just gotten into hydroponics due to a lack of usable land, in my office. I find the air is better, and the environment more pleasant, and when the jasmine blooms you can smell it down the hall.
I read in one of your newsletters that polyester fill worked as a media. I had trouble with strawberries getting moldy with perlite. Polyester (pillow stuffing) in a 2" mesh pot pushed through a hole in styrofoam is working very well. The setup is simple, just a window planter box (water proofed), an aquarium "bubbler" and I keep the water level about even in the bottom of the mesh pots. No other media is used.
The idea of using the polyester fill has worked out very well for me. In a 2' x 4' space in my office I have 23 strawberry plants. (I also have anthurium, spider, pothos, arabian jasmine, "scented" coleus, coleus, carnations and 3 types of mint.) The punch line to this is my office has no windows.
I couldn't have gone this far this fast without your newsletter.
Thanks.
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2. A few curious facts about pyrophyllite clay
Considered by some to be a wonder supplement, pyropyhllite clay is a material that should be considered by a grower when trying to get top production from his operation. This material has just about everything including silica, the second most abundant element to be found in soil.
When analyzed, plants contain anywhere from 1 to 10 per cent of silica which evidently would have a strong influence on a plant's behavior. Pyrophyllite clay has 59.6% silicon or silicate salt. The next 22.9% is aluminum, another abundant natural material. The remaining 17.5% is made up of anything from 4.7 % to just a trace of 61 elements, many of which are quite beneficial to promoting plant health.
Though pyrophyllite clay is relatively scarce, it can be obtained under such brand names as Pyroclay, Seaclay or Mineral Magic. Pyrophyllite clay can play a very active role in a plant's life span. Just silicon alone can contribute greatly to a plant's growth, strength, mineral nutrition, resistance to fungus and adverse media conditions. Throw in all of the above elements and there's no telling how much help the plant gets if one uses pyrophyllite clay as a supplement.
Note that only phyrophyllite clay is the silica based material that should be used. All others should be avoided
One thing to be avoided even with pyrophyllite clay: don't let plant roots come into contact with the clay when it is dry.
You can use pyrophyllite clay in a variety of ways. If you're propagating or transplanting a plant, lightly dust the media around the plant. For rockwool drip systems, put 25 grams under the dripper.
If you have powdery mildew on a plant, use a pyropyllite clay spray in the ratio of 25 grams to 100 liters. Mix it well in the water for around 20 minutes so it becomes soluble. Apply directly to the leaves where the mildew lies.
Keep in mind when adding pyrophyllite clay to a recirculating nutrient system that you are adding extra nutrients to your main nutrient base. This will not be a problem if your mixture of the clay to the nutrient solution is no more than 14 ppm (parts per million). To get this concentration you will need to add 23.5 grams of phyrophyllite clay to 265 gallons (1000 liters) of your nutrient solution.
According to many growers, phyropyllite clay is a great defense weapon to be used against mildew, fusarium, botrytis, pythium and phytopthera not to mention a variety of other pests. Tests have proven this clay's effectiveness for a plant's health and its ability to produce at the maximum.
If only half of what it is supposed to do were true, this specific clay would certainly be a material worth looking into.
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3. Odds and ends
A. If you're using rockwool bags or slabs, you should make sure there is room for air space underneath the bags. And never allow rockwool bags to lie in liquid for any period of time past a few minutes.
B. Keep your eyes on the pH factor as plants grow from one phase to another. For example, if you're using rockwool for growing plants, you must know the pH of the rockwool slab as well as the pH of the nutrient coming into the slab.
If you don't watch out, the slab pH will get too high and then you will have problems with plant growth. This can happen easily when the crop is growing rapidly. Then you can lower the drip feeding solution's pH to as much as 5.3 to 5.5 and still keep the pH of the slab in the desired 5.5 to 6.0 range.
Both the slab solution and the dripline solution are important. During summer, the plants will rely more on the dripline solution; in the winter the plants will rely more on the slab solution.
It's best to monitor both solutions during all seasons. Just keep the pH in the slab or media between 5.5 and 6.0 at all times and you won't go wrong. And keep in mind that plants rely to a greater or lesser degree on both the media solution and the dripline or feeding solution.
C. The following is from a recent study from the University of Koln.
You know what the cure is for the "Sick Building"? You work or live there but somehow things don't seem quite right. You get the "blues" from time to time.
Well here come Ficus Bengamina, Pothos and there friends to the rescue! They'll will help clean the air in your sick building. They'll remove such pollutants as nicotine, formaldehyde, phenol and benzol and convert them to sugars, growth and oxygen.
It's advisable that your plants not be in pots with soil but rather in a hydroponic culture setup. Hydroculture plants will make the air more humid and cut down the amount of static electricity which in abundance can also shut down your computer systems.
Not only that, but plants in a hydroponic culture setup can also help reduce spores such as fungus which float through the air. This would be a boon to those who have allergies.
Want to feel better at work? Start up your hydroculture plants and sit back and enjoy.
It doesn't take much to cleanse an area. Just add 2 plants for ever 100 square feet.
D. According to one authority, you shouldn't buy your nutrients from the standard formulae you can find in the average garden store. These standard brands don't have the necessary trace elements needed for a successful hydroponic operation.
This may be true. But I know of at least one grower who did quite well with the standard fertilizer found at the feed store. He said the standard feed store brand had all the trace elements his crops needed.
Nevertheless it's best to stick to the tried and true. One of the best growers I know of, and from whom I learned a lot, mixes his fertilizers to make certain he gets in all the necessary trace elements.
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4. Mesclun and then some
In New South Wales, Australia, Pacific Hydroponics has changed its hydroponic head lettuce operation over to a strictly mesclun setup. This change over has been expensive and time consuming but absolutely necessary when you have customers such as Ansett Airlines and Quantus who demand quality and consistency.
One big advantage of this new approach is that Pacific Hydroponics now gets several cuttings from each plant. Another advantage is that the workers don't have to pick or strip off the leaves. Now they just cut them off and dump them into a bin where they are transferred to the processing plant.
Then begins a speedy but chilly process. The temperature is kept at 5 degrees centigrade in the processing room and all the way to the delivery point. Lettuce is perishable and must be handled gently and quickly.
Each lettuce leaf is washed three times, washed again in chilled water and placed in a centrifuge which spins off the excess water. After that the leaf is packaged in a bag which has had most of the oxygen replaced by nitrogen.
You can imagine the many thousands of dollars of equipment needed to run such an operation. But when the stakes and market opportunities are high, so the costs become high.
To service high quality markets with clientele who demand the best, Pacific Hydroponics grows a large variety of lettuces and herbs. Some of these include red oak lettuce, green oak lettuce, cos, Frisbee, butter lettuce, Monet, Frillice, red coral, green coral, Ronet, Red Velvet, mignonette. These are then packaged to customer specifications.
Aside from the technical details of the growing setup which would vary from one operation to another, a carry-over feature that most operations might employ is "Hazard Analysis at Critical Control Points" or HACCP. Pacific Hydroponics employs this technique to assure smooth and economical production.
In other words, you find the places where something could go wrong and then prepare to deal with it or even prevent it.
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5. Green Lacewing - Beneficial Insect of the month
The adult Green Lacewing is a somewhat fragile looking creature, with a long green body and large translucent wings. The insect has large golden eyes. And though it is not as well known as some other beneficial insects such as the ladybug, the lacewing feeds on the same kinds of pests. One more thing: the lacewing is more likely to hang around your garden than to fly off to another.
The adult eats nothing but honeydew, nectar and pollen which seem to stimulate the egg-laying process. So if you want to keep them in your garden, try to have those plants which produce nectar and lots of pollen. Female lacewings will lay around two hundred eggs.
It's the lacewing progeny which are a bane of such insect pests as thrips, mites, aphids, white-flies, scales, mealy-bugs, spider mites, caterpillar eggs. In fact if the lacewing larva can catch it and the body is not to tough, the larva will even attack adult insects. These larvae are also cannabalistic - they will eat their own given half a chance. But there is no better predator known for eating lots of insect pests eggs. A single larva can consume as many as 60 adult aphids an hour!
The green lacewing life cycle goes like this: The adult female lays the eggs, usually suspended separately on leaves or small branches to ward off future cannabalism. The hatching phase takes 5 days. Then the larva begins its insatiable quest for prey. It's often called the "aphid lion" because of its appetite and voraciousness.
The lacewing larva is very small and looks like a tiny alligator with pincers which it uses to grasp its prey. After capturing its prey, the lacewing larva will inject a venom which paralyzes the prey. The larva then sucks out the body fluids from its prey.
This process last about 12-14 days at which time the larva goes into the cocoon stage and "sleeps" for ten days after which the new and beautiful adult creature emerges and the cycle starts all over again. The adult lives 4-6 weeks and will stay in the general area as long as honeydew, pollen and nectar are available.
Note: The "honeydew" referred to is that created by whitefly, scales and aphids.
For those who want to raise green lacewing, go to: (http://www.mayhillpress.com/insects2.html).
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"Big Dollars Growing Gourmet Salad Greens"
"Beneficial Insects - How to Mass Rear and Make a Profit"
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